ReGlasgow

CITY Getting Further £4Million To Make Space For People

22 August, 2020 | Active Travel

GLASGOW’S Spaces for People programme has secured an additional £4million for initiatives that support physical distancing in public places.

This takes the total amount awarded to the council for the programme to £7.5million.

The money, from Sustrans Scotland, will be used to expand temporary travel infrastructure projects giving extra space for people to walk, wheel and cycle as lockdown restrictions ease.

As well as being put towards towards widening footways in busier areas and creating pop-up cycle lanes, the funding will allow progress on other measures such as park-and-pedal and park-and-stride facilities at satellite car parks, along with the roll-out of pedestrian priority measures at traffic-light controlled junctions.

Clearance of overhanging vegetation that can narrow footways across city neighbourhoods has also been identified as a practical way to make it easier to keep a safe distance from others when travelling actively. Other initiatives to be advanced include the expansion of school car-free zones.

These latest plans are expected to complement infrastructure already delivered, with the earliest Spaces for People projects seeing Kelvin Way closed to traffic to facilitate access to Kelvingrove Park, and the creation of a pop-up cycle lane on the Broomielaw, above, to ease physical distancing on nearby footways.

Other measures delivered include the provision of additional pedestrian space around Glasgow Central and Queen Street stations and footway widening across key city centre streets. The east and west sides of George Square have been pedestrianised, with sustainable transport corridors created nearby.

Queen Street

Further initiatives introduced in the city centre to suppress Covid-19 include traffic light automation that removes the need for pedestrians to touch equipment to prompt the green man to display.

Short-term measures across neighbourhoods have seen the removal of kerbside parking in areas of high pedestrian footfall to allow for footway widening, with temporary infrastructure now in place in areas including Easterhouse, Cessnock, Bridgeton and Partick.

Spaces for People has also boosted cycling provision across the city, with pop-up cycle lanes now in use on London Road, Great Western Road, Gorbals Street and Cumbernauld Road.

Bilsland Drive is to get similar measures and locations being considered for future pop-ups include St Andrews Drive, Wallacewell Road and Edinburgh Road.

Councillor Anna Richardson, convener for sustainability and carbon reduction, said: “Throughout the city we have been re-purposing our roads and footways to provide extra space for walking, wheeling and cycling and help people maintain physical distancing during the Covid-19 emergency.

“The breadth of measures we’ve delivered so far shows our clear commitment to creating the safer spaces necessary to help people get on with their lives and accelerate our recovery.

“These changes can also encourage more and more of us to consider sustainable travel as a viable long-term choice that not only benefits our environment but also our wellbeing.

“I’m delighted that our second Spaces for People bid to Sustrans Scotland was successful meaning we can build further on the infrastructure we’ve created so far.”

| Spaces for People

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